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In the year 1970 there was a terrible earthquake in Peru, my home country, in which around 70,000 people died. At that time I was 17 years old and lived in Lima, the capital of Peru. The epicenter of the quake was in the northeast, in the cordillera of the Andes above the altitude of 10,000 feet (3000 meters), where very tall mountains were forever covered in snow and where there were some isolated towns.

Soon after the disaster there was a general call for volunteers to come and help the thousands of victims that now were without homes or food, and in many cases were dead or trapped alive in the debris.

I was a teenager thirsty for adventure, and together with three friends we decided to answer the call to help and went to the disaster zone. We went by foot almost the entire time in the mountainous area, since the roads were destroyed or in bad condition and were impassible for motorized vehicles, since the geography is very rugged and the climate inhospitable.

Once at our destination, we began our work of helping people to rebuild their homes, remove the debris, etc.

When it was time for us to leave, the roads were still closed, but in any case we decided to leave and to leave on foot, a bold decision that would later give us a huge scare and much suffering.

We put on our backpacks and began the crossing of these mountains, which are very similar to the Alps with much snow and precipices, almost no vegetation, and very cold.

Some neighbors in the town had told us that it wasn’t going to rain, that the weather was going to be more or less good, wrong!! From one moment to the next the sky darkened and a ferocious storm began, with thunder and lightning that came down against the mountains around us. We began to panic, since we were basically without protection, dead with cold, and without adequate equipment for this kind of weather or for emergencies.

Within a few seconds we were soaked with watered and a wind blew furiously in our faces. The situation was indescribable, it felt like a horror movie. The cold was terrible and we didn’t have a place or shelter in which to protect ourselves. We tried to hug each other and curl up together but it wasn’t much help. I felt like I was going to die and I’m sure that my friends felt the same. Nobody spoke, we just shivered.

At some point I began to feel faint, thinking that the end had arrived, and under my breath I made a prayer to commend myself to God, and upon finishing, what a surprise!! I saw light from a lantern lighting up our faces. They were 3 men dressed as mountaineers with their appropriate and adequate equipment. They found us by chance and helped us. I still remember in the middle of that drama and pain feeling the happiness and excitement that surely everyone who is rescued must feel.

Those men put up a small tent as soon as they found us to give us a temporary shelter, although the weather was still very bad. They covered us with blankets and gave us hot drinks. I will always be thankful to those anonymous men who with their solidarity for others saved our lives.

I never heard from them again, and now after more than 40 years I tell this story for the first time.